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Readers! A November fund-raising drive!

 

It is unfortunately time for another November fund-raising campaign to support my work here at Behind the Black. I really dislike doing these, but 2025 is so far turning out to be a very poor year for donations and subscriptions, the worst since 2020. I very much need your support for this webpage to survive.

 

And I think I provide real value. Fifteen years ago I said SLS was garbage and should be cancelled. Almost a decade ago I said Orion was a lie and a bad idea. As early as 1998, long before almost anyone else, I predicted in my first book, Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8, that private enterprise and freedom would conquer the solar system, not government. Very early in the COVID panic and continuing throughout I noted that every policy put forth by the government (masks, social distancing, lockdowns, jab mandates) was wrong, misguided, and did more harm than good. In planetary science, while everyone else in the media still thinks Mars has no water, I have been reporting the real results from the orbiters now for more than five years, that Mars is in fact a planet largely covered with ice.

 

I could continue with numerous other examples. If you want to know what others will discover a decade hence, read what I write here at Behind the Black. And if you read my most recent book, Conscious Choice, you will find out what is going to happen in space in the next century.

 

 

This last claim might sound like hubris on my part, but I base it on my overall track record.

 

So please consider donating or subscribing to Behind the Black, either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. I could really use the support at this time. There are five ways of doing so:

 

1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.

 

2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation. Takes about a 10% cut.
 

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Vostochny update

This article provides a good updated overview of the status of Russia’s new Vostochny spaceport.

It appears they will finally begin ramping up the launch rate with Soyuz rockets in 2018.

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

2 comments

  • LocalFluff

    In words it always seems as if the Russians are up to something new in space. But they still fly the Soyuz (Sputnik launcher á la 1957) and Proton since 52 years. And operate a space station or a half in LEO. Sure, this has been super great and leading in human space exploration, for several decades! But, isn’t it now facing competitive challenges that it lacks dynamics to counter effectively? The Russian space launcher development pipeline looks very empty. Only words echo throughout it’s length from Moscow to East Siberia.

    In the 2020s there might no longer be any Russian orbital launches at all. I bet 50/50 on that.

  • Dick Eagleson

    I don’t disagree with your general sentiment, but I think the 2020’s is a bit early for the curtain on Russian space effort to be rung down.

    ISS will be going until at least 2024, very possibly longer. Russia will continue to launch crew and cargo there until it’s gone, whenever that turns out to be. After ISS goes, though, there may well be no more manned Russian space program. I don’t give those Russian plans to take their ISS modules, add some more that have been ground-bound for years and make their own “ISS-ski” much credence. Russia, put simply, can’t afford to do this.

    Russia will still launch satellites for its own purposes, but few or none will be commercial launches for non-Russian clients as the 2020’s wear on. And the satellite launchers will be Soyuzes and Protons. The Angara seems to be on an SLS-like development schedule that keeps moving rightward at about the same rate as the calendar. If it ever actually enters service, Angara will fly infrequently. Both Baikonur and Vostochny may be ghost towns in two more decades. Plesetsk will still operate as the Russian military needs to do missile tests. But there will be fewer of these as well.

    In short, the Russian space program, like Russia itself in the longer term, will most probably expire with a whimper rather than a bang. It will resemble a process more than an event. The actual end of the program might only be evident retrospectively.

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